We refer to Prof Jim Adesina’s contribution to the debate concerning the Superior Courts Bill “Misreading
the Superior Court Bill” (Grocott’s Mail, Tuesday 13 July) which suggests that criticism of the Bill is against transformation and “based on a misreading of the Bill of disinformation”.
We refer to Prof Jim Adesina’s contribution to the debate concerning the Superior Courts Bill “Misreading
the Superior Court Bill” (Grocott’s Mail, Tuesday 13 July) which suggests that criticism of the Bill is against transformation and “based on a misreading of the Bill of disinformation”.
These fi ndings are incorrect for the following reasons:
• The Renaming of High Courts Act was not a half-way house “to overhauling the apartheid judicial architecture”.
That Act did nothing to the jurisdictional mess of the Eastern Cape. It did not create four provincial divisions.All it did was rename the courts.This was purely cosmetic.
• The Bill itself does not deal with the areas of jurisdiction of the various proposed local seats. It proposes that those areas will be determined by a subsequent process and promulgated by the Minister.
Bhisho itself is a creation of apartheid so even the selection of Bhisho as our provincial capital makes no sense.
To move the seat of the court to Bhisho will only further perpetuate what was created by apartheid and which has never put down roots.
Professionals will almost certainly relocate to East London rather than to Bhisho, or even King William’s Town, so small communities will not benefi t whatsoever.
• Adesina refers to other provinces but it is not clear why. The issue is the location of the seat in the Eastern Cape. The debate about the Gauteng courts is very different to that of the Eastern Cape.
• The argument concerning judicial independence is muddled. Because there is no reason for relocation based upon physical proximity, insistence on relocation must be based upon some hidden motive.
The poverty of Adesina’s argument is quickly discerned from the only function of the judiciary he can put forward with which to justify physical proximity, namely, swearing in a new premier. What a fragile base for an argument!
• No-one critical of the Bill thinks that the High Court in Grahamstown will be immediately closed. The issue is the downgrading of the seat to a local division.
Adesina also states that relocation of the seat to Bhisho will affect “in the main, the Judge President, the Register, the Master of the High Court, or similar offi cer.”
In fact relocation of the seat will result in a reduction of the number of judges sitting in Grahamstown, a reduction of staff in the High Court, the relocation of significant staff of the office of the Director of Public Prosecutions, as well as the relocation of the Master’s office.
Then there is the more significant reduction in the number of attorneys and advocates in town. These errors in Adesina’s understanding of the structure of the legal profession has led him to his most serious error: underplaying the economic consequences of the relocation of the seat.
He fails to deal with the consequences to Grahamstown of even 20 professionals selling up and relocating.
• The absence of reference to the legal profession as an independent item in the Makana 2009 document is used by Adesina to downplay the importance of the legal profession in Grahamstown.
This misreads the document. The legal profession is incorporated into the 2009 document in two sectors, namely, the government and service sectors.
Both are shown to be important, indeed vital, sectors in Makana. Adesina’s argument is therefore based upon a confusion of categories such that a fi rst year student should be taught to avoid.
• Adesina goes on in the same paragraph to refer “to the cost of refurbishing a forensic laboratory at the Fort England hospital”.
There is no such thing. He must be confused about the forensic unit of the hospital which deals with the evaluation and detentionof criminals.
• Adesina then refers to some of the economic advantages of Grahamstown and goes on in the same breath to blame poverty on wage levels.
That such simplistic statements come from a professor of sociology is alarming. The removal of major income earners from the local economy, which will indeed be the result of relocation of the seat, can only lead to an aggravation of the poverty levels in the city.
• Adesina then proceeds to suggest that the critics of the Bill should accept the Bill because it is proposed by “a Minister elected with a post-apartheid mandate.”
Ministers of our present government have no infallibility and are not above criticism. In the same breath Adesina suggests that the retention of the seat is directed to preserve “the privileges of 358 years of settlercolonialism.”
This grand sounding argument is not going to do much to feed the dependents of the secretaries and messengers retrenched, nor of the domestic servants laid off by relocating attorneys and advocates.
It is very easy to use long words and to cast aspersions relating to transformation and disinformation. The harsh reality is that the debate about the relocation of the seat is about the better administration of justice and the economic consequences to Grahamstown.
As the Hoexter Commission demonstrated, no-one has been able to advance any sound reason for the relocation of the seat relating to the better administration of justice.
The Secretary, Grahamstown High Court Action Committee
